BtS SGOTM 09 - Back to the Future
Welcome to your BtS SGOTM 9 Team Thread. Please use it for all internal team communication, turn logs and discussions. Subscribe to it to receive notifications, and do not visit the other team threads for this game until you have finished. Please also subscribe to the Maintenance Thread for this game, where teams and staff may post non-spoiler information of general interest.

The Game
This is the second Beyond the Sword SGOTM. Thanks, Gyathaar

You are Pericles of Greece. You have travelled back to 4000 BC, but you took with you a knowledge of several modern technologies. Your task is now to return to the modern era as fast as possible, and to reach for the stars.

This is a Quick speed, Monarch difficulty game on a Standard sized mystery map. There are no goody huts, no events and no city razing.

Pericles is Philosophical and Creative. The Phalanx is your unique unit, replacing the Axeman; and the Odeon unique building replaces the Colosseum. As well as your usual starting techs, Hunting and Fishing, you brought with you a comprehensive library of text books.

The Objective
All victory conditions are enabled, but laurels will be awarded to teams with the quickest Space victories.

Versions
This game will be played in Civilization IV Beyond the Sword, version 3.17, using HoF Mod 3.17.001.

If a later BtS patch is released during this game you will NOT be able to use it to play. You will need to complete this game in version 3.17 before updating your copy of BtS, or create and update a separate copy.

As there is no Mac version of BtS, Mac players can only join in if they are able to run the Windows version on their system.

Please plan to complete the game within three months of the start date.

NOTE: Barring unforeseen disasters there will be a four month final deadline.
I shall declare winners and losers from those teams that have finished on July 27, 2009.

Starting Position
Here's the starting position - click the image below to see a larger version.

Map Parameters

Playable Leader/Civ - Pericles of the Greek Empire.

Characteristics - Philosophical and Creative, starts with Hunting and Fishing

You and all the AI also know Fascism, Scientific Method, Physics, Medicine, Flight, Machinery, Replaceable Parts and Superconductors

Unique Unit - Phalanx (Axeman)

Unique Building - Odeon (Colosseum)

Difficulty - Monarch

Game Speed - Quick (330 turns)

World size - Standard

Rivals - Probably

Landform - Mystery

Environment - Not saying

Other settings - No city razing, No goodie huts, No events

Notes

Please visit the Civ4 SGOTM reference thread to check out the rules and procedures to ensure that you are adequately prepared for this game.

Teams will compete for up to four awards - the Gold, Silver and Bronze Laurels for the teams with the fastest Spaceship victories, and the Wooden Spoons for the finishing team with the lowest final score.

All saved game files uploaded to the server are parsed through software that extracts and archives data about your save, including reload count for each turn set.

The next player shall post a ”got it” within 48 hours of the upload of the previous game. Else the next available player has the right to post the ”got it”. These rules replaces guideline 6 and 7 in the C-IV SGOTM Reference Thread. To ensure a smooth handover, please post the ”got it” within 36 hours. The rest of the team needs the in between 12 hours to solve who's next. It is mandatory to wait at least 12 hours after the "got it" before you play, and it's recommended to wait at least 24 hours after the ”got it” before you play. Else, the difference in time zones and busy work days may prevent players to post useful advice. If you for some reason have to "unget it", please post within 24 after the "got it" if possible. We aim to play one turn set / 5 days.

Before you start playing, please post a short plan for your turn set (aka Pre-Play-Plan), including the following topics: builds, military activity per theatre, tile improvements, research, civic switches, diplomatic actions and miscellaneously. Also describe the intent. You don't need to write a novel. A sentence or two for each topic will suffice. This will hopefully enable each player to feel more engagement. It is not intended to replace the incredible amount of interference advice from the rest of us The PPP-template can be found here. Please use the same post for the PPP and mark updates with different color, or put the obsolete PPP in within spoiler tags. This will make it easier for us to keep track of updates/duplicates of the PPP. When you report from a turn set, please use one post. This will make it much easier for me to assemble the event post below.

We will use mid-turnset uploads during intense turn sets. If you are playing while other are online, please upload and the rest of us can review the save (typically an hour review period). In addition/complement to that, a player shall break after move of starting warrior, initial city settlement, writing discovered, alpha discovered, or something really exciting/unexpected happens, such as anyone declares on us. I don't want us to be too strict and pause for minor stuff, because that will have a negative impact on the flow of play for the player. It is important that everyone in the team feels they have the mandate to take decisions when we encounter opportunities without having to ask for advice. One example would be tech trade with AIs that we have agreed on to trade with.

No-one is forced to play a turn set. You don’t need to announce the reason for skipping a turn set. Any players can swap turn sets if they announce the swap in time. Since the captain has a memory capacity of a demented gold fish, I urge you to make it clear when you intend to skip a turn. Please post as quick as possible to reduce unnecessary confusion and delays.

Please use smilies and emotes in your posts as much as possible. Jokes, humor, sarcasm and offensive language can and will be misinterpreted. Remember that written text is a poor method to convey feelings. Several of us are not native to the English language (LC for example use American English). The differences in culture is also a source for misunderstanding. If you get upset by a post, please wait a few hours before you respond. With this in mind I would like to encourage all and everyone to trash talk to your hearts content, particularly when Gnejs (aka Mr UN) screws up.

Don’t be afraid to post things that may appear stupid or evident. Each player have strengths and weaknesses. There are numerous examples in the SGOTM4/5/6/7/8 threads when the most simple rule has been unknown to several of us (such as the difference between peace treaty and cease fire). Don’t be afraid that other members will think you are stupid. As a captain, I am obliged to post the most stupid questions to ensure that the rest of the team appear brighter.

Issues where we cannot reach consensus is resolved by the active player. If you run into a situation where you need advice, please upload the save and let the rest of us take a look. Or post a quick request for advice. It’s better to delay the game a day than build the Globe Theatre in the wrong city Don’t be afraid making mistakes though. We all screw up once in a while (some of us more often than others though )

Don’t promote units until they are close to action (unless the promotion increases movement). If you are unsure of suitable promotions, don’t hesitate to bring that up for discussion. We all have very different experiences from promotions, for example barrage/CR for cats, and combat vs other promotions.

Don’t play intoxicated (from alcohol, drugs or smoke). Don’t play when you are too tired. Or when you have your kids/wife screaming at you

Try to keep track of the diplomatic events each turn, and visit each city regularly. It’s mandatory to check cities that grow or have a border expansion. Remember that the number of happy people will change due to changes in war weariness (WW), gained/lost resources etc. Keep track of specialists. We don’t want to unnecessarily pollute the great person pool. Please respect LC’s micro management plans. We brought him to tears last game when we whipped a city on the wrong turn .

Ensure that you have the autosave settings to 1. Please contact AlanH if your game crashes after an irreversible action (include me in the private message), even if you can repeat all your moves. Read this post for details.

If you PM the team, please ensure everyone one receives a copy. Remember that a lot of players read what we post. Don't be rude or disrespectful to any player not on our team. Of course it's alright to mock any member of CRC or CFR if the opportunity arise

Try to run a test game or two before we start. Your experience may either confirm or contradict some one else's, and is therefore valuable.

The goal for Team Murky Waters is to end among the top three teams. The ambition is to grab the silver laurel and the vision is to win defend regain the goldwin this freekin competition! Again!!

This is the motto of the Captain: "We have an ambition to perform well and of course we want to win the gold laurel. We also want to have fun while playing and we want to learn more. It's more important to me to have fun than win the gold, and I think that it's the same for most players."

If you play with a non-english version of the game (yes, I'm thinking of you jesusin ), please provide a translation to English of the event log.

Don't forget to enable all HOF settings in case you lost them during a dual-install or whatever reason. And set the first-turn-setting to first turn = 0. This will reduce future confusion. Set MaxAutoSaves in CivilizationIV.ini to a value greater than the length of your turn set. Please remember to backup your autosaves after your turnset to enable review later.

When you state the turn/year research is completed (or any other event), please use the turn/year that is stated by the event log. Research for example is completed at the end of a turn. The pop up thus shows the turn after the tech is learned.

Keep track of AI's attitudes about DoWing and see if it changes to: "We have enough on our hands now."

When the game is over, and the staff has confirmed it's over, you are free to read other team threads. When their game is over, and the staff has confirmed it, you are free to post in their threads as well.

Ok, if you have bothered to read this far, you are eligible to either a) ignore this crap or b) provide valuable comments (please email me at captain.murky_waters@dev.null)

BTW, I am considering to update the motto for this SGOTM to be: "Remember that your turn set is the most important in the game, so don't screw up!". Anyone against?

* Guidelines 5-7 does not apply to our game. You are free to upload before the end of your last turn if there are actions left that you don't really care about, and which you think the next player may do different. You can "get it" without first opening the save.

Special with the knowledge of modern techs:No barbarians once enough AI have reached industrial/modern ageThe AI will build more troops. Especially it wants 2 garrison from the beginning, and 3 in coastal towns ( in BtS normally only 1 needed in ancient era ). Also the needed "floating defenders" is much higher.
This might delay building of settlers.
The AI will never build academies.
Barracks may be built earlier.
The AI has a 10% bonus for modern age (they are growing, building and researching more like immortal than monarch).Police State and Environmentalism available as civics from start.Electricity and Genetics available as free tech from Oracle/Liberalism
We can circumnavigate early with airships and open border.

General Strategy ConsiderationsWe decided that we would cottage our capital, not build forest preserves around it, because:

Cottages will produce more base commerce, which gets the Bureaucracy bonus, compared with National Park scientists, which don't.

If we went with preserves, then it would become a super-city as soon as we get Biology, but we couldn't pair National Park with both National Epic and Oxford. This way, we get two super-cities after Bio, the cottaged capital and the NP city.

Going with preserves would allow better early-midgame production. We guessed that the stronger late-game research would be more important than this.

We took Civil Service from the Oracle. Although there was some discussion about a beaker difference in favour of Electricity, I think we chose to chase Civil Service because in the early game, gaining turns is more important than gaining beakers. CS would have taken around 7 or 8 turns to research by hand, but in the end, Electricity took just two turns.

We also focused on getting a huge empire, at the expense of early and midgame research. This was to make the research phase at the end go as quickly as possible. We'll find out whether this paid off when we can read the other teams' threads.
We wanted to use Liberalism to slingshot Assembly Line, and only then begin intensive research, but maintenance costs turned out to be too high, and we needed State Property before we got anywhere near AL. This plan was thus aborted, and we used Liberalism for Communism. Just imagine what would have happenned if we had been able to attack Shaka when we planned to. Would we have gotten to Comm. in any reasonable time? I will be very interested to see how other teams deal with this.

Estimated launch dates through the ages
We made our first serious estimate at around t120, after we had started the war against Shaka, and guessed that we would need a 5-GP Golden Age. Here are our predictions from then on:

Turnset log
Turnset 1, played by LowtherCastle: 4000 BC - 3100 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
After some discussion, the scout moved NW-SW, revealing tundra and ice to the northwest, so Murky Waters was founded in 3940 BC, one tile south of the starting location.
A worker was built and the scout revealed marble among the plains, before finding several food resources (rice, clams, pigs, fish, cows) to the south, and eventually a barbarian "battleship" (actually a highly promoted galley ).
The borders of a barbarian city are spotted across the water.
Techs learned: Agriculture, Animal Husbandry

Turnset 2, played by ZPV: 3100 BC - 2500 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
Exploration continued, as the scout went south along the coast, meeting Joao II of Portugal. A Settler was built in Murky Waters at size 3, allowing lots of overflow into a Library.
Techs Learned: Writing

Turnset 3, played by klarius: 2500 BC - 2020 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset reportFrozen Fish was founded 3N of Murky Waters in 2500 BC. A Library was built in MW, and two scientists were hired immediately. The scout found some Portugese land, where Joao was being attacked by some highly promoted barbarian warriors. The team agreed to go for a Civil Service slingshot with the Oracle.
Techs Learned: Mysticism, Meditation, Priesthood

Turnset 4, played by FiveAces: 2020 BC - 1540 BC. Pre-Play-Plan, part 1part 2Turnset report
Discussion rises, as the team debate which techs to research, and what date the CS-slingshot should be. We agree on a variant that gives Bronze Working and The Wheel before CS, and a second Great Scientist. This carried some risk, because it delayed the Oracle by a couple of turns, but it sped up our early development substantially.
A Great Scientist was born in MW in 2020 BC, and he created an Academy there in 1960 BC.
A worker built in Frozen Fish completed a road to Murky Waters, giving a trade route.
Techs Learned: The Wheel, Mining, Bronze Working

Turnset 5, played by jesusin: 1540 BC - 1060 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
A second Great Scientist was born and settled in Murky Waters, in the run up to the CS slingshot. With the aid of a little chopping, the Oracle was built in 1240BC in MW, and we revolted to Bureaucracy and Slavery in 1180BC. Meanwhile, our second city built a settler, and Marble was founded 3 west of the capital in 1120BC. Immediately after this, an Airship was built to aid exploration. We met Hammurabi of Babylon at this time, on the very same turn he met Joao.
Discussion covered a key point at this stage, it takes fewer worker turns to chop+improve in one go than to chop and improve separately. Someone notices that jesusin is an anagram of jeniuss. As a native English speaker, I fail to see the significance of this.
Techs Learned: Mathematics, Code of Laws, Civil Service, Pottery

Turnset 6, played by Gnejs: 1060 BC - 720 BC. Pre-Play-Plan, part 1part 2Turnset report
Our Airship scouts the barbarian city, which turns out to be a behemoth called Atlantis, on a 1 tile island in the middle of the sea. It has many buildings, including Palace, Castle, Granary, Trading Post, Lighthouse, Levee, National Park, Globe Theatre, Heroic Epic, Barracks, Ikhanda, Drydock, Wall, Dun, Red Cross, Dike, Forge and West Point.
Our glorious redlined scout was sacrificed to a barbarian warrior, in a time-honoured tradition. Needless to say, the plank was walked by Gnejs.
The airship scouts some more, and meets Shaka of Zululand, entirely by chance. We explored a patch of sea and one tile of the other continet, and Shaka moved a unit there IBT. . The airship rebased in Ulundi, now known as the home of the Pyramids, since Shaka built them in 960 BC. From Ulundi, the airship met Huayna Capac of Inca.
We researched Alphabet in 960 BC, and found that Sailing wasn't tradeable, but Iron Working was available. Immediately, we revolted to Confucianism to help our ailing happy cap.
We were in Settler spam mode, and prepared settlers for several sites, as you will see in the next turnsets. However, we were afraid of the barbarians. Klarius helpfully told us that they strongly prefer to land next to a city, however. This meant that if we didn't settle within one tile of the coast south of the ice, the marauders from Atlantis would leave us alone, and continue to harass Joao. We also took this into account later with our dotmaps, limiting the barbarians to a single possible landing tile, which we fortified with crack troops.
Techs Learned: Alphabet, Iron Working, Archery, Sailing

Turnset 7, played by Erkon: 720 BC - 400 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
This was a time of extravagant building for our civ. How appropriate that Erkon took the helm for these turns!
Our exploring airship met Wang Kon of Korea and circumnavigated the globe, giving all our ships one extra movement. Two cities were founded; KonTiki, on the island to the east, with fish, sheep and furs. gave us a much needed happiness resource, and had several good tiles to work. In the south, we planned our city locations, to work all the good tiles, but stay safe from the barbs. C1, the first of these, was founded by Erkon, with Uranium, Iron, Wheat, Cows, and too many plains tiles to count.
Techs Learned:Currency, Paper, Polytheism

Turnset 8, played by ZPV: 400 BC - 80 BC. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
Discussion reached its peak during the run-up to this turnset, mostly due to LowtherCastle being on holiday. In the end, we decided we would found 4 more cities on the mainland, in the south ASAP. Fine Leg (known as C3 in discussion) was founded 1N of the southernmost wines, with Rice, Cows and 2 wines. On this spot, there was only one tile where the barbs could land, and we placed a couple of maces there, for barbs to suicide amphibiously. This had the dual benefits of reducing the barbarian threat and giving our units experience, and ultimately allowing us to build the Heroic Epic. For the rest of the time, settlers were being built, and moving into position. Education was the research target during these turns, but with hindsight it might have been better to try and lightbulb it with a Great Scientist. Worker actions were co-ordinated so that enough forests could be chopped to build 6 universities in 2 turns when Education was researched.
Techs Learned:Masonry, Monotheism

Turnset 9, played by LowtherCastle: 80 BC - 230 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We researched Education in 1 AD, set tech to 0%, and traded for Construction. We kept research at 0% until we had built Oxford University. Two more cities were founded, Mosquito Ranch in the far south, with Fish, Clams, Pigs and a number of lake tiles, and Flood Plains on the south-west coast, a fast-growing city with no food resources.
We then met Stalin of Russia a leader with few redeeming qualities. His main quality was that he had a little gold to trade to us.
Just for laughs, the barbarians were the first to Philosophy, and founded Taoism in Hun, a city south of Shaka. Freekin' builders!
They also decided that they wanted to attack Shaka, owner of The Great Wall, so they airlifted no fewer than FIFTEEN CR3 macemen to Hun, where they sat uselessly, glaring at Ulundi. Barbarians should not really target the home of the GW.
Techs Learned:Education, Construction

Turnset 10, played by klarius: 230 AD - 470 AD. Pre-Play-Plan, part 1part 2Turnset report
This was a key turnset. In the wise words of our captain, one of the most important in the game!
Progress was fast, as we traded for Monarchy on the first turn, built Oxford on the second (260 AD), got a 10XP unit by fighting barbs, revolted to HeredRule and OrgRel, and built the Heroic Epic in C1. We decided that we would start a golden age for the building phase when we would train as many paratroopers as possible. For this, we needed the free Great Artist from Music. To increase the effect of this, we traded for Calendar, and started the Mausoleum of Maussollos.
Techs Learned:Monarchy, Aesthetics, Literature, Music, Calendar, Gunpowder

Turnset 11, played by jesusin: 470 AD - 710 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We settled our last city for some time, SW Clams, with fish, clams, and a number of plains hills to be windmilled. Hammurabi built the (Christian) Apostolic Palace, something that would later give us some headaches, as he would try to pass resolutions against us. We built the MoM in 530 AD to compensate.
We started a Golden Age using the free Great Artist from Music, and discovered Rifling in 620 AD, and started to build up our force of paratroopers. The plan was to overrun Hammurabi and Shaka as quickly as possible, and reevaluate from there. Meanwhile, KonTiki, our island city, would build a couple of paratroopers to paradrop onto the other continent, and try to capture the lucrative barbarian cities there.
Techs Learned:Rifling, Compass, Optics

Turnset 12, played by Gnejs: 710 AD - 900 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
The focus here was to get Astronomy as quickly as possible, so we could capture Ulundi at the earliest possible date. To do this, we traded for what little gold the AI had, but we needed 10 gold more for Astro in 800AD. We begged for 10 gold from Shaka. He gave it to us. Unfortunately, this gave him a peace treaty, so we had to delay our attack on him, and instead focus on the deserving-to-be-punished Hammurabi. This was a big setback, and we felt very doubtful about our chances after this, due to our units being in entirely the wrong places. We also struggled to capture barbarian cities in Europe, because units from Atlantis were being airlifted to replace the ones we killed.
Techs Learned:Astronomy, Engineering

Turnset 13, played by FiveAces: 900 AD - 1020 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We captured the barbarian city with silks to Stalin's west, Libyan in 920 AD, and then Declared War on Hammurabi in 940 AD. He tries to pass a resolution to make us stop the war against him - we defy it because we want to build National Park in Babylon. We also Declared War on Shaka in 1000 AD, and captured uMgungundlovu that turn. Babylon fell to us in 1020 AD
Techs Learned:Chemistry

Turnset 14, played by Erkon: 1020 AD - 1180 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We discovered Biology in 1020 AD, so Babylon could start the NP as soon as it came out of revolt. We managed to capture Dur-Kurigalzu, Akkad, and Nippur before we would have to decide what to do about the next AP vote. In the end, after a long saga of will-we-won't-we drama, we accepted Hammurabi's capitulation, before the vote was allowed to pass. Was this a wise move? Probably not. The next turn, we had a serious case of "Why didn't we think of that last turn" syndrome.
We captured Ulundi in 1140 AD, and transported most of our paratroopers to Africa to continue the campaign against the Zulus.
Techs Learned:Biology, Feudalism, Drama, Theology, Steam Power

Turnset 15, played by LowtherCastle: 1180 AD - 1340 AD. Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
Morale is low, but is raised by our capture of 13 Zulu workers, and all of their cities. Oh no, it did not take 8 turns, but just 5 turns for us to capture Nodwengo, kwaDukuza, Ondini, Nongoma, Nobamba, and Ndondakusuka. Shaka was eliminated in 1280 AD Wediscovered that colony costs were high, and would become higher still, so we researched Liberalism and took Communism, rather than a more expensive technology. Meanwhile, we were preparing for the research phase of the game, and preparing for a thrid war. We considered settling a junk city to give to Huayna Capac, so he would meet Joao. That would mean Joao would trade Philosophy to us. However, this was unneccesary, because HC peacefully became our vassal. This meant he met Joao, who didn't think Philosophy was a monopoly any more, and traded it to us. We entered our end-of-game Golden Age at this point, using 2 Great People. We also settled a city to the south of our capital, near Atlantis. Due to being the Greeks, this city was called Athens
Techs Learned:Printing Press, Metal Casting, Philosophy, Liberalism, Communism

Turnset 16, played by ZPV: 1340 AD - 1450 AD Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We re-entered builder mode, as we settled three cities near the start of the turnset, Morocco, in northern Africa, Suez on the isthmus between Africa and Asia, and Launchpad Tower on the river in Europe. We also captured the barbarian cities Hun, (Taoist holy city in Zimbabwe), Assyrian in Spain, and Atlantis. We built the Hanging Gardens in MW, for the bonus population in all our cities, and strove to research as quickly as possible, thanks to State Property removing most of our maintenance costs. For no particular reason , we Declared War on Joao II in 1420 AD, capturing Guimaraes in the south with 3 seafood and cows, Lisbon and Faro on the East Coast. During these 8 turns, the research rate skyrocketed from less than 1000bpt to more than 2500bpt, allowing many technologies to be researched in just one turn each.
Techs Learned:Guilds, Banking, Economics, Constitution, Corporation, Assembly Line, Electricity

Turnset 17, played by klarius: 1450 AD - 1530 AD Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
We captured a number of Portuguese cities (Braga, Evora, Santarem, Lagos and Oporto), and despite some stiff resistance in the last of these, Joao capitulated to us in 1490 AD. This was in spite of the disorganized mess (all those paratroopers all over the place ) that had been left by the previous player. We even captured Easter Island Egg, the second barbarian city that existed at the start of the game. On the spaceship front, things went extremely smoothly, and we built the Apollo Program in 1520 AD.
Techs Learned: Industrialism, Rocketry, Steel, Railroad, Radio

Turnset 18, played by jesusin: 1530 AD - 1610 AD Pre-Play-PlanTurnset report
LowtherCastle observed that we could MM our cities to give us more than 5000bpt, so we set ourselves the target of 1 tech/turn from here to the end, and launch one turn after all useful technologies are known.
However, thanks to excellent play by jesusin, we were able to outperform even this target. 3 Great Scientists were able to lightbulb the entirity of Computers, and thanks to starvation of cities by hiring scientists instead of working useless food tiles, we researched 9 techs in 8 turns, with thousands of beakers to spare.
Techs Learned: Combustion, Plastics, Satellites, Composites, Fission, Computers, Fiber Optics, Fusion, Genetics

Turnset 19, played by LowtherCastle: 1610 AD - 1670 AD Pre-Play-Plan, part 1part 2Turnset report
To get things finshed off in one night, we handed the reins to our fastest player - the one who believes in no MM at all, leaving all the city builds and worker actions to the governor. In a bizarre run of form, the governor builds the parts in cities with high production, and everything is timed perfectly. In 1630 AD, the Giant Metal Thing (TM) was sent to the stars, while the now infamous governor farmed over all our towns, to let our population grow as much as possible.
This was all forgiven when the spaceship arrived safely at Alpha Centurai, and much rejoicing was had when AlanH confirmed that everything was in order.

__________________Formerly known as ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF.It's pronounced "Zupp-flui-depff"

Anybody interested in a test save?
Note, that this game will play quite different from normal in the beginning.
Windmills and forest preserves under environmentalism are pretty good commerce tiles. Police state can make work boat building faster.
And there is the question what to target with oracle. CS, electricity or genetics .

LC:

Quote:

Very different. Erkon's airships plus OBs might get us circumnavigation plus trading partners. There are lots of other details that are interesting too.

As for research, I've estimated that the beakers might go like this:

Phase 1: 898 beakers for the CS-slingshot
Phase 2: 20,721 b for the AL-slingshot (incl. Sid's Sushi)
Phase 3: 102,104 for the rest of the techs

This includes guestimating what techs we'll get for free. Beakers include the 20%-prereq discount.

CS-sling is possible at least by 1300BC (T45) using only what we can see (ignoring klarius' GloryLand...). So if we continue at 45t per phase, then we need to average 460bpt for Phase 2 and then 2270bpt for Phase 3. That's about what we did last game, so I don't know if SId's Sushi is better than State Property. WOuld we have time to develop it? (I've never been corpulent.)

Erkon:

Quote:

Different indeed! Forest Preserves + Environmentalism will enable very large cities early on. No need for cottages Windmills instead of mines I got the Oracle a bit later than LC, and I was purely research limited.

I didn't detect any barbarians. Wont they spawn once the advance techs are learned?

What are the chances for forests to spread with preserves?

And how come I did not get access to Uranium although I mined and roaded it? I want a BC Carrier

I forgot to test if we can airlift units into AI cities we have open borders with. If so, we can lift maces and cats, then backstab No need for ships

I think this will be the funniest game so far. Sorry Gnejs and jesusin, we will probably discuss a lot!

klarius:

Quote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

Different indeed! Forest Preserves + Environmentalism will enable very large cities early on. No need for cottages Windmills instead of mines

Oxford city should still have (many) cottages for the long run. Other cities might get along with mills and preserves to later switch to workshops.
Also a question if we really should aim to have big cities early, or rather use the early advantage to build more cities.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

I didn't detect any barbarians. Wont they spawn once the advance techs are learned?

The game is in modern era. There are no barbs anymore.
BTW, modern era, the AI gets a per era modifier of 2% on monarch (10% total for modern). So they are growing, building and researching more like immortal than monarch.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

What are the chances for forests to spread with preserves?

64/10000 instead of 8/10000 per adjacent tile.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

And how come I did not get access to Uranium although I mined and roaded it? I want a BC Carrier

Again , uranium needs fission to use.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

I forgot to test if we can airlift units into AI cities we have open borders with. If so, we can lift maces and cats, then backstab No need for ships

No.

Erkon:

Quote:

Quote:

klarius wrote: Oxford city should still have (many) cottages for the long run. Other cities might get along with mills and preserves to later switch to workshops.
Also a question if we really should aim to have big cities early, or rather use the early advantage to build more cities.

Yes, of course we shall have cottages for Oxford and cities surrounded by non-forests. But I'm reluctant to chop forests in this game.

Well, there is still the question if CS with Oracle is the way to go.
It is also possible to research CS , you know.
We can have electricity (with improved mills) or the very expensive genetics (with no direct benefit).
In that case our research is not predestined and we could fit in BW or alphabet (to trade for BW and other techs).

There is also a big question where to settle. On the corn is very strong short term (BTW, I think wb first is better there). But a start with 20 land tiles to work (in place or maybe 1 south to make room for a city north) makes a much stronger city in the long run.

#1 Probably yes.
#2 Definitely if there is any decent site.
#3 Agri is not necessary when settling on the corn.
#4 Windmills, maybe chop if going the BW way. Maybe a watermill if going the electricity way. I still don't think that growing the capital is most important.
#5 REX yes, if we need to pop-rush is another question.

A few more observations about the modern era start:
The AI will build more troops. Especially it wants 2 garrison from the beginning 3 in coastal towns ( in BtS normally only 1 needed in acient era ). Also the needed "floating defenders" is much higher.
This might dealy building of settlers.
The AI will never build academies.
Barracks may be built earlier.

Well, there is still the question if CS with Oracle is the way to go.
It is also possible to research CS , you know.
We can have electricity (with improved mills) or the very expensive genetics (with no direct benefit).
In that case our research is not predestined and we could fit in BW or alphabet (to trade for BW and other techs).

Dynamic had an excellent Gauntlet date with an Emporer space race recently and I checked his save in detail. Obviously, he was using a tailored start, with gold mines, etc., but that's not important. He did the CS-slingshot. More interesting though is that he spent 7 turns researching Electricity and 4 turns on Genetics, so neither are relatively 'more expensive' than CS. Furthermore, there's a question of timing. Dynamic posted that he needs research time to finish certain space parts, so the Genetics 4t slingshot may actually be zero savings. I'm not sure what's happening when he does Electricity, so this is one of many good reasons for us to run a few tests to conclusion.

I think we need to look elsewhere for a rationale on whether to build the Oracle and if so, what to slingshot. Freeing up our research path is one reason. REX might be another. Warfare, a third. Or a combination. In comparing the Dynamic save and an outrageous Ironhead save on the other recent Immortal space race gauntlet, Dynamic builds only three cities before 1000BC and then in the late BCs goes on the warpath for his other Oxford cities.

Ironhead plays with Darius, has immortals in his FC, and has killed off something like 6 AIs by 2000BC . He builds every wonder under the sun and when he finishes before 1200AD he's teching I forget which Future Tech.

So we should be prepared to go either way: Oracle or Warpath, depending on how close AIs are.

Another detail: In my tests, some AIs have already built an airship by the CS-sling (1300bc) and they soon have up to four airships in their cities. So capturing cities will get progressively more difficult till we get some massive military advantage, like cats or something.

LC:

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No city razing. The Ais might settle in screwy locations and mess us up totally.

Erkon:

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Running klarius test save I missed the Oracle (Oracle BIFAL 1300 BC).

I was experimenting with worker, 1/2 warrior, settler, library, worker

Sparta founded 2500 BC, academy 1660 BC

Settled 1S, built 2 farms, 2 windmills, then forest preserves. I will test again and skip the windmills to see if I can get the Oracle quicker.

I prefer a long term strong capital. Settling 1S may also gain us a couple more river tiles in FC.

In my experience, a Space Race is research limited i.e. we need to find out the highest tech pace. Important dates:
Education & Oxford
Astronomy & Observatories/Laboratories
Others?

Erkon:

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Another test, and this time the Oracle was BIFAL in 1480 BC.

I can't see us getting one settler, a library and the oracle before 1480 BC...

Perhaps postpone library until after Oracle and pick Electricity?

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Originally Posted by Erkon

Running klarius test save I missed the Oracle (Oracle BIFAL 1300 BC).

Erkon:

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More spam...

Civil Service vs Electricity

CS will take ~14 turns to research by hand. Bureaucracy generates ~300 beakers and ~70-100 hammers, which then has to be compensated by Electricity. The two extra commerce from the windmills + bureaucracy + library + academy = 2*1.5 + 75% = ~5 bpt. Break even after 60 turns, and quicker if we run more windmills (in capital or other cities). The hammers will not be regain.

Then there is the question of timing. The 14 turns lag will be catched up eventually, but will the oxford date suffer? OTOH, Electricity is worth a lot of beakers, and that would open up Radio to grab with Liberalism.

I would guess that the top three teams finish within 5 turns. Saving the turns on Electricity and Radio will be a significant saving.

The early tech rate may not be that crucial considering REXing (one new city every five turns for example). As I see it, currency is needed once we have a couple of cities. Are there any other techs that we really need early? Apart from CS of course.

If we decide on Oracle, and don't want to take any chances, we will have to skip either the settler or the library. I think we should skip the settler, to speed up research.

klarius:

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Well, for what do we need AH?
Think along the line of Agri-myst-med-ph-writing.
Worker-warrior-settler-Oracle-library (finished before Oracle finished).

Another idea is:
Agri-mining-BW (3 way revolt for 1 turn on quick)-myst-med-ph-writing
probably to late to get CS by Oracle, but 2-3 settlers before Oracle should be possible and library can be pop-rushed during Oracle build.

At 1480BC we go from 40bpt to 60bpt. Alpha in 5t, settler in 5t at 14fhpt. We save something less than 16t on CS, depending on what another city or two might have added to the 40bpt. I cannot improve on my 1360BC Oracle settling 1S.

Note that I previously said Dynamic researched electricity for 7t and Superconducters, 3t Genetics at 4t. I forgot the minor detail of those dates being Epic speed. So multiply them by (.67)*(.67) and you get our reality:

After that my general strategy was:
Build settlers/workers in capital until pottery is known, and REX to 6 cities, building as many workers in the outer cities as possible. Then build forest preserves in the capital and grow it to size 20+.
After clearing basic techs, Paper-Education-(Oxford in capital) -Gunpowder-Rifling (conquer 3 AIs with paratroopers) - Chemistry-Biology (build Nat. Park in Capital for 15 free specialists to work in Oxford) - Nationalism-Constitution -> Assembly Line

A few more Quick speed factors of note:
* tile movement on Quick speed is very expensive (no 67% factor)
* building roads is very expensive (2t/road = samenumber of turns as Normal speed before Hagia or whatever, but 120 years > than 80 years for Normal)
* poprushing is rounded down to 6t, which is beneficial on Quick (should be 6.7t)

Just to see how expensive road movement is, Ironhead's save using Darius and a map with plenty of barren flat tiles at Marathon speed, his Immortals were able to arrive at the enemy 8X faster than our axes can arrive.... So for him, an early rush was a pre-planned no-brainer. For us, it's almost a brainless idiocy unless we happen to have an AI placed ridiculously close.

As I see it, these topics are up for discussion:Where to move the scout? What tiles do we want to reveal i.e. what tiles will have an impact on capital? Capital 1S may block utilization of sea resource east of hill for example.Where to settle? Shall we focus on short term (on corn 1NE) with better start tile (+1) + no wasted turn or long term (1S) with more land tiles?How to balance second settler, academy and Oracle. Test games indicate that Oracle can be BIDL around 1500 BC, which will prevent us from building second settler before Oracle.Early tech path? Skip AH for example may delay Academy, but save us turns on the Oracle.What free tech to choose? CS or Electricity? The accumulated extra commerce from windmills is more than the commerce we get from Bureaucracy for ~16 turns, but how does timing have an impact? Delaying the next tech for ~16 turns may be too costly, but are we in a hurry? Currency will help us once our empire is large, but what techs are important before Education? Perhaps the Education date is determined by how fast we can get six cities large enough for poprushing unis? Or getting two GS for lightbulbing Philosophy and Edu?How extreme REX shall we run post Oracle. Capital churn out settlers, while new cities build workers? Is it enough with one worker improving new cities? When does REX end - 6 cities?When do we attack our neighbors? Shall we wait until Paratroopers?

We don't need to decide on these issues right away, since they are map dependent, and not that urgent to settle. I suggest that we decide on where to move the scout first, and then LC can post a screenie.

Scout 1NW - may give us a stronger reason to settle 1NE i.e. this move shall be done if we favor settle 1S.
Scout S-SE - will reveal sea food and/or resources SE of settler. This move is perhaps the best since it will reveal tiles for both the corn-capital and 1S capital.
Scout S-SW - will reveal tiles that convince us that 1S is best. This move shall be done if we favor settlement on corn.

As I see it, these topics are up for discussion:1. Where to move the scout? What tiles do we want to reveal i.e. what tiles will have an impact on capital? Capital 1S may block utilization of sea resource east of hill for example.2. Where to settle? Shall we focus on short term (on corn 1NE) with better start tile (+1) + no wasted turn or long term (1S) with more land tiles?3. How to balance second settler, academy and Oracle. Test games indicate that Oracle can be BIDL around 1500 BC, which will prevent us from building second settler before Oracle.4. Early tech path? Skip AH for example may delay Academy, but save us turns on the Oracle.5. What free tech to choose? CS or Electricity? The accumulated extra commerce from windmills is more than the commerce we get from Bureaucracy for ~16 turns, but how does timing have an impact? Delaying the next tech for ~16 turns may be too costly, but are we in a hurry? Currency will help us once our empire is large, but what techs are important before Education? Perhaps the Education date is determined by how fast we can get six cities large enough for poprushing unis? Or getting two GS for lightbulbing Philosophy and Edu?6. How extreme REX shall we run post Oracle. Capital churn out settlers, while new cities build workers? Is it enough with one worker improving new cities? When does REX end - 6 cities?7. When do we attack our neighbors? Shall we wait until Paratroopers?

We don't need to decide on these issues right away, since they are map dependent, and not that urgent to settle. I suggest that we decide on where to move the scout first, and then LC can post a screenie.

Scout 1NW - may give us a stronger reason to settle 1NE i.e. this move shall be done if we favor settle 1S.
Scout S-SE - will reveal sea food and/or resources SE of settler. This move is perhaps the best since it will reveal tiles for both the corn-capital and 1S capital.
Scout S-SW - will reveal tiles that convince us that 1S is best. This move shall be done if we favor settlement on corn.

I suggest we move the scout S-SE onto the plains-hills-forest.

1. I favour settling 1S, so I think the scout should move NW-W to investigate the blue circle.
2. Production in the capital is very important, and 1S has better production potential. I think this outweighs the faster start associated with 1NE, but I'm not sure.3. My vote is: early settler, early academy, no Oracle. In my tests (on klarius's test map), I actually got Oxford faster without the Oracle, thanks to the faster expansion.
4. Depends on the map and the status of the Oracle. Imortant early techs are BW, Pottery, Sailing, Writing.
5. After that, just alphabet, currency, calendar would be necessary off the Education beeline. No need for lightbulbing this early, but I'm not dead against it because I haven't tried it.
6. Extreme REX with large capital. Fast growth in capital (ideally with granary), followed at some point by Worker-Settler-Worker-Settler-Worker-Settler-Settler-Workerx5 or something like that. We need many, many workers. At least 2 per city, especially if we intend for large(ish) cities with forest preserves or happy resources.
7. Barring unforseen circumstances I think Paras are the best option. We can capture 1 city per turn or more starting at 5-600AD with Paratroopers vs Archers. Enemy Longbows won't make too much difference. I had a lot of fun with this on the test map.

__________________Formerly known as ZPVCSPLFUIFDPEF.It's pronounced "Zupp-flui-depff"

We are research limited again. And you know what? It's beakers that count, not turns

So, if we go for early CS, are we going to have a lot of cottages in the capital?

I'd prefer not to settle in corn. We are going to space, so long game, so long term considerations have more weight.

Welcome jesusin

Yes, we are research limited i.e. we need to reach the set amount of beakers as quickly as possible. So how is the fastest path to get there? To sacrifice research early on and expand to build up a strong empire that can run strong research in the mid-end game?

Cottages in capital prevents a large capital (happiness from forest preserves). National Park in capital will enable lots of scientists and is comparable (one scientist / forest preserve). I'm not sure which is best. Preserves with B. gives more hammers than cottages unless we run the civic that adds a hammers for each town.

Yes, long term considerations shall have significantly more weight, but is that really related to the capital? Settle on corn saves us about 5 turns on our early expansion, and thats a couple of turns early win date. Can we compensate this with a stronger mid-end game capital? Again, I'm not convinced either way, and I think we should move the scout before we start this discussion in earnest

I am going to have a try at a test game to familiarize myself a bit before trying to post anything useful. Though one question that occurred to me is if we can utilize the national park + forest preserves combo, perhaps in the capital, perhaps in another city. I have usually chopped all forests long before biology so I have no idea if this gives enough payback or not.

One thing people are not talking about in the Oracle discussion, is to build it in the second city. To get electricity should still be easy, if one does BW early, so one can chop it. Or we may have a location where it can be hand built.

My tentative recommendation for the capital is settler very soon after worker (not even completing a warrior before).

In the long term versus short term discussion one should also consider that one could switch the palace to another location, if there is something good .

National park with forest preserves looks nice, but it's a long way to biology. It's only 1 city which can do this and I don't see why this has to be the capital.

I am going to have a try at a test game to familiarize myself a bit before trying to post anything useful. Though one question that occurred to me is if we can utilize the national park + forest preserves combo, perhaps in the capital, perhaps in another city. I have usually chopped all forests long before biology so I have no idea if this gives enough payback or not.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Erkon

...Cottages in capital prevents a large capital (happiness from forest preserves). National Park in capital will enable lots of scientists and is comparable (one scientist / forest preserve). I'm not sure which is best. Preserves with B. gives more hammers than cottages unless we run the civic that adds a hammers for each town...

Me thinks that Mr Gnejs should read the pre-game discussion before attempting a test game

I mean - welcome Sir! Nice to have you on board.

Yes, forest preserves + National Park will enable us to run up to 20 specialists in capital depending on the terrain (including GP from corn). In my test game, this occurs around 1100 AD, and once the MM-masters are unleashed, we'll probably end up around 500 AD if we want. So you have identified a fundamental part of the early planning (most certainly by chance)

Further observations from the LC map:

One captured AI capital had an academy.

No cities had any walls.

Several AI became vassals to one AI peacefully.

Paratroopers who start in city can drop up to 5 tiles (distance identical to city with 80% culture), the tile must be exposed (defogged is not enough) and must not contain an enemy unit. The unit can continue with movement (two tiles on roads), but cannot attack.

Paratroopers with C1 have 95% against 40% cities with LBM on hills. Think SGOTM8 infantries but much more powerful due to paradrop.

A stack of paratroopers can capture one city every second turn.

Did I say that paratroopers really kick ass?

We need workers. Lots of workers. 2/city is not too many.

To me, it will fit well if we get our ~6 cities, develop them, and then attack with paratroopers.

One thing people are not talking about in the Oracle discussion, is to build it in the second city. To get electricity should still be easy, if one does BW early, so one can chop it. Or we may have a location where it can be hand built.

My tentative recommendation for the capital is settler very soon after worker (not even completing a warrior before).

In the long term versus short term discussion one should also consider that one could switch the palace to another location, if there is something good .

National park with forest preserves looks nice, but it's a long way to biology. It's only 1 city which can do this and I don't see why this has to be the capital.

I tried the Oracle in second city and it works with 4 chops (Oracle 1600 BC; Electricity 1540 BC; four workers; two warriors). Capital at pop5 churning out workers and settlers. The only drawback is the delayed Academy, but that will be compensated for the windmill beakers eventually. There is a bit of MM of course (Agriculture first, then Myst=>Med=>PH first and then Mining=>BW, or Mining=>BW directly after agriculture?) that has an impact on the worker builds + actions.

klarius - you're a freekin genius! My initial thought on capital + oxford + nat.park was like this: The Bureaucracy bonus hammers are additive, yes?, so the ~14 hammers from the forests end up as a 7 hammer bonus. The commerce bonus is multiplicative, so the 2 (3 on river) ends up at 3 (4.5). Add 3 from the scientists, and we get 6 (7.5), which on average is slightly less than Bureaucracy towns (5*1.5 = 7.5). All in all, it's not a big difference between running cottage-capital or preserve-capital (cottages have to mature, while preserves give fix amount from start).

Now, what just occurred to me is that we should not run scientists in nat.park city, we should run merchants. And we should not build oxford, but wall street. So we grow our capital with preserves, while our soon-to-be-capital is cottaged. This second city should have plenty of forest that we can chop into Oxford (268 hammers) and the Palace (107 hammers). A site with forests on grassland is thus optimum, and should not be hard to find. Running merchants in nat.park city enables us to run higher research-%, which in turn increase the utilization of Oxford. Voila!

The only drawback is the delayed Academy, but that will be compensated for the windmill beakers eventually. There is a bit of MM of course (Agriculture first, then Myst=>Med=>PH first and then Mining=>BW, or Mining=>BW directly after agriculture?) that has an impact on the worker builds + actions.

Whatever you do, try it again with agri-ah-wtg first, and I'll wager it will work better.

We have half-priced libraries and half-priced academies. So the sooner we get the acad, the sooner we get myst-medit-phood-mng-bw for half-price. You should have the academy by 2020BC at the very latest.

Cottages in capital prevents a large capital (happiness from forest preserves). National Park in capital will enable lots of scientists and is comparable (one scientist / forest preserve). I'm not sure which is best. Preserves with B. gives more hammers than cottages unless we run the civic that adds a hammers for each town.

Yes, long term considerations shall have significantly more weight, but is that really related to the capital?

In my typical space game I'll run Bureaucracy all game long, I'll cottage spam my capital and get Oxford there, so the capital accounts for 50% of my research capacity while the other 11 cities account for the other 50%. When having 20 cities capital accounts for 40% of total research.

We are discussing what to do with Oracle. Oracle->CS can be the best use, even if it is less immediate beakers. But for that to be true, we need to put Bureaucracy to good use. What will we do with our capital? Specialist gold and beakers is not affected by the Bureaucracy bonus.

In the scenario you are describing it would be better not to choose CS.

Whatever you do, try it again with agri-ah-wtg first, and I'll wager it will work better.

We have half-priced libraries and half-priced academies. So the sooner we get the acad, the sooner we get myst-medit-phood-mng-bw for half-price. You should have the academy by 2020BC at the very latest.

Hmm, I don't get it to work. Worker, Settler (sneak in partly warrior to grow to 2), workers + library etc, Oracle in second city 1420 BC (Electricity 1360 BC). Agri, AH, Writing, Myst, Med, PH, Mining, BW. I would like to save two turns on the Oracle date.